Drug testing issue hinged on 2 cases

Gary Tomlin The Register-Mail

Sunday

Oct 1, 2017 at 12:01 AM

GALESBURG — When the results of Lindsey Earls’ random drug test were left lying on the choir teacher’s desk at Oklahoma’s Tecumseh High School, her parents filed suit against the school district. They demanded the school district cease random drug testing of students. Ultimately the Supreme Court ruled.

The precedent for random drug testing was established in an earlier Supreme Court decision: In Vernonia (Oregon) School District vs. Acton, the school board initiated a random drug testing policy of athletes, which brought a legal challenge on constitutional grounds. In 1995, the Supreme Court decided in favor of testing.

The Tecumseh case relied heavily on interpreting the Vernonia case.

The Supreme Court took the Earls’ case in 2002, and Attorney Linda M. Meoli argued on behalf of the school district.

“It's also a way for these students to say no. Peer pressure among elementary and secondary school children is very significant.,” she told the judges. “We're just asking you to give us the tools to deter drug use, to help those drug users.”

Weighing in for the federal government, Paul D. Clements, deputy solicitor general of U.S. Justice Department argued in support of the school district’s position.

“As this court has emphasized on a number of occasions, by making the testing program applicable only to an avoidable activity, the school district would be ensuring the reasonableness of the program under the Fourth Amendment,” Clements said.

This is the argument on which the case turned, and it is the reason random drug testing policies are limited to those participating in extracurricular activities, because students can choose not to participate.

Clements argued that the policy is constitutional because the students agree to the testing, but Justice John Paul Stevens pointed out students are under “tremendous pressure” to agree to testing.

Attorney Graham A. Boyd pleaded for the Earls.

“This is a school that has in place cameras in the halls, security guards, drug dogs that sweep through the school and the parking lot and the students. They search lockers. They have teachers who are trained in looking for drug use. They have all of these things in place, and they have a mandatory reporting policy that if they discover any drug use, they have to report it. Now, over the years, that's added up to two instances of drugs being found, none of them associated with non-athletes, none of them associated with extracurricular activities,” Boyd argued.

In a 5-4 decision, Justices Clarence Thomas, William Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy agreed with the school district. Justices Sandra Day O’Conner, David Souter, John Paul Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg dissented. Stephen Breyer didn’t join the court opinion but agreed with the school district.

Justice Thomas said that, reasonableness is the touchstone of the Constitutionality of a governmental search.

President George W. Bush endorsed random student drug testing in his 2004 State of the Union address. More than 130 schools or school districts have received funds through U.S. Department of Education grants to help develop or maintain random testing programs, and thousands more schools are implementing drug testing programs using other sources of funding. Department of Education initiated a series of research grants then implementation grants. Other organizations and universities studied the effects of random student drug testing.

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